


see her light up the night and the sea (she calls me)

by Evanaissante



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Badass Alice Quinn, F/F, Fairy Tale Elements, Fluff, Kady is a Princess, Pirates, Spells & Enchantments, Swordfighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-01
Updated: 2019-09-01
Packaged: 2020-10-05 00:17:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20479835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evanaissante/pseuds/Evanaissante
Summary: After a library book swallows Kady and Alice, they find themselves trapped in a world of princesses, knights and dragons. It wouldn’t be so bad if Kady wasn’t one of the said princesses and if her fictional father wasn’t trying to marry her to a random guy wearing tights. Thankfully, Alice has a sword.





	see her light up the night and the sea (she calls me)

**Author's Note:**

> this is Stupid and Gay but the theme was disney/animated and my mind went to "kady as a princess, alice as a pirate king" so, have it!

It all started with a book, which shouldn’t have surprised Kady because her life was now filled with mountains and mountains of dusty old books that somehow tried to kill her in one way or another, but it did. Now, she was a resourceful type of girl, she had to be with the situations her mother had put her through, but she was not certain that anything could have prepared her for what had happened that day.

At first, she’d been having a totally, normal, basic, even  _ boring _ morning. She had woken up in the luxurious loft that she was sharing with far too many people who she sometimes barely tolerated, she had an unsatisfying breakfast, then Eliot had given her a cup of coffee, a little too sweet but comforting, and a talking bunny.

Eliot usually did that, that wasn’t the surprise. He was the one who caught the message bunnies and acted like the loft’s receptionist, mostly because he was the one who sent the most out too, with Margo living in Fillory ten months out of the year he had to get by, but he did also make the connection between their world and the library out of the goodness of his heart, and some threats of throwing him out if he kept monopolizing all of their means of communication to gush over Quentin with Margo. He liked to leave colourful post-it notes all over the fridge when he couldn’t keep track of all of the messages, but it seemed like his prefered method was still dropping the bunnies directly into people’s knees dramatically.

This bunny, a little thing with auburn fur and huge brown eyes, came from the library.

Where Alice was.

Kady wouldn’t say that she had a soft spot for Alice, even if Julia teased her about it constantly. She wouldn’t actually say that she had any soft spots, she liked to believe that she was kind of like a cool android, iron brawns and all of that shit, but she did admit that Alice was a tender subject in the sense that Alice was complicated and a little too present on Kady’s mind. When Alice had come back and apologized to her, Kady had really hated her guts. She hadn’t been able to help it, it was an automatic response, a bit like her fist colliding with Alice’s face, but afterwards, when they’d been forced to team up, she had gotten to know Alice Quinn. And not the edulcorated version of Alice Quinn that kept her powers in check and tried to play nice with others because Quentin wanted her to and  _ blah blah blah _ . No, she’d met  _ the  _ Alice Quinn, the one who was unapologetically powerful and a true asshole.

Kady had loved that.

Which meant that now, she still worked with Alice Quinn. She liked it even, not only because having Alice around made her feel things she didn’t want to name yet, but also because an alliance with the library made her Hedges the strongest witches in New York, if not the entire country and that was definitely a turn on. But even though they worked together regularly and kept in contact, Alice rarely sent bunnies. She only reserved them for special occasions, like apocalyptic emergencies.

When Kady arrived at the library, she almost got knocked over by a book that was flying around like a psychotic parrot. Books in the library didn’t usually start flying out of nowhere, they were magical beings with an attitude like Brakebills’ but they were also far more polite and put together. They were  _ The Books _ , after all, the ones needed for the proper running of the universe, if one of them was flying like this unattended, it truly meant that shit had hit the fan.

“Alice?” She called out, looking for the blonde behind the A to D shelves, “I got your bunny.”

Since Alice had become Head of the Library, the place had been a lot more welcoming. The grey walls had been painted a pale purple, the metals shelves had been replaced by wooden ones, there were comfortable chairs down every aisle and plants enlivened the entire area. It felt like a real place, not just a point stuck in time and coloured literally fifty shades of grey. The staff was also a lot more approachable and warm, they had stopped wearing basic pantsuits and opted for actual clothes that pleased them personally, like that guy Stanley who only wore Legend of Zelda shirts.

(Kady never told him that she recognised the designs, she was maybe a video game nerd but that was her secret and her secret alone.)

But no one welcomed her at the door, no one was there, her calls echoed and came back to her unanswered. Something was wrong, Kady was now sure of it. No matter the size of the issue, the librarians never neglected their work, especially not Alice.

She called the blonde’s name again but it was useless. She passed the E to H shelves, pushing away the books that flew towards her anxiously before stopping in her tracks. She’d been wrong before, the books weren’t flying everywhere, they were circling a particular spot in the library, their pages flapping loudly as they dived towards the kids’ section dangerously fast.

The kids’ section was new in the library and a little bit controversial with a few of the oldest, most conservative librarians. When Alice has taken her responsibilities as the new leader, she’d asked for this section to be built. It was smaller, just the size to fit a fuzzy IKEA carpet as well as a single shelf and two bean bags but it represented a huge change. Kids were welcome to stay in the library as long as they wanted when they parents were working, because yes, the first thing Alice had established firm laws that allowed librarians to have family lives as well as paid family vacations and everything that having children included.

Alice had made this place a family-friendly enterprise and Kady could have made a joke about how sweet that was, but seeing Alice change things like this just so that people around her could be happy and have a full life, it made Kady like her and her stupid serious face even more.

She walked towards the kids’ section, hands jittery, ready to throw a spell if something went south or just punch her way through the problem, that usually worked better anyway. A book flapped on her left, she ignored it. Kady wasn’t the most attuned with magic in general, she was an expert battle magician, but she didn’t feel magic in her bones the same way Julia or Alice did. She wasn’t connected to the ambient like them, she didn’t feel it light up sparks in her palm or electrify every nerve in her body, but she could feel it all over this place. It came in waves and it made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. She hated it.

“Alice?” She called out again. She didn’t want to get too close, but she couldn’t see anything with the flickering lights and she took another tentative step towards the section.

The books around her flapped their paper wings harder and harder to the point where Kady couldn’t hear anything else. She tried to avoid the flying objects, but they were everywhere, creating gusts of wind around her. She couldn’t keep them away, they pushed her and she could feel the ground move under her feet.

She fell.

It happened quickly, too quickly for her to stop it. One moment she was swatting books off her face and the next, she was falling through a pitch-black hole. She might have screamed, but she didn’t remember it. Everything was blurry, even her.

Her heard felt like cotton, her tongue was heavy in her mouth and her hands grabbed what they were touching, ripping it apart to give herself some countenance. It was grass, the soft and humid type, the healthy kind of grass that Kady had only ever seen in Brakebills.

She let out a choked breath, her throat hurt and she couldn’t find her footing. Something was wrong, her body didn’t feel like her own and the world around her felt uncomplete. She reached out for her magic unconsciously, her fingers tracing the air, but she could not form anything, her magic, just like her body, didn’t respond.

The air was devoid of magic.

“What the fuck,” She murmured, hair covering her face, “What the  _ fuck _ ?!” She tried to stand up and groaned, her legs didn’t want to cooperate and her entire body ached. She stumbled a little but got up on her two feet and pushed away from the mass of hair that was blocking her view.

The first thing she noticed, apart from the fact that there was no magic around her, was that this was  _ not _ Brakebills. It didn’t seem like any place of New York either or any place at all.

The landscape in front of her didn’t look real, and not just a Fillory kind of unreal, everything around her was  _ animated _ . She was walking and breathing inside of a colourful child drawing. 

She knew it was a child’s drawing because was everything seemed just a bit wrong. Not excessively so, but just enough to awaken the instinct that screamed to get out of her.

The sky was purple, not a neon one, just a soft pastel purple that didn’t exist out of Hot Topic. The grass was green, that was normal, but it also sparkled like a Christmas tree and that was less normal. It looked like it was covered in iridescent glitter and it hurt Kady’s eyes the more she looked at it. 

Suddenly, she heard a loud roar on her right that made her jump slightly. She turned, her legs complaining at the sudden strain, and saw a gigantic shadow overtake the purple sky.

It was a dragon. A dragon covered in black scales, with a large tail that was tearing apart the forest below as it flew. Its eyes were pink and smoke was coming out of its nostrils.

Kady tried to run but that’s when she noticed that she was no longer wearing her leather jacket and jeans, instead, she was tuck in an emerald green silk dress with long sleeves covering her hands. But she didn’t have the time to observe her outfit, she took a pan of the dress and ripped it off before throwing it away and running.

She heard the dragon behind her flap its wings vigorously but she kept on running. She couldn’t look back or she’d fall and break an ankle. Why was she wearing heels anyway? You’d think an animated child drawing would be as fucking cliché as putting all the girls in dresses and heels.

She ran forward, the wind howling in her ears as the dragon followed her, howling too. In the distance, she saw movement and she felt a burst of hope explode in her chest.

Men in armour, covered from head to toe in steel and holding large swords that they pointed towards the creature, were arriving her way, perched upon beautiful black horses. She dived on the side of the road, just in time to avoid the horses and the ball of fire the dragon had sent her way.

The first knights didn’t have her luck and she saw them get burned alive, screaming with their agonising horses. Kady wasn’t easily disturbed, but she knew that this would be engraved in her mind forever.

Another knight, slimmer than the others but far more agile in his horse, took his sword in his head, twirled it over his head like a javelin and threw it towards the dragon’s open mouth. It shouldn’t have worked, the creature was huge and spitting literal fire, but it did.

The beast fell.

Kady stood up, her knees stinging a little, she could feel a trickle of blood rolling down her leg but she didn’t care, her eyes were fixed on the knight. He came down his horse gracefully, like he’d done it since he was born, grabbed his helmet and pulled it off.

Kady almost expected to see Alice under the helmet, she hoped to catch a glimpse of shiny blond hair, but it really was a man under there and Kyad felt a spike of disappointment spear through her. 

The man had piercing yellow eyes, when he turned towards her, Kady lost her breath. He didn’t look human, he looked far more like a monster than the dragon had. Kady half wondered if the horror she felt while watching him was provoked by the colour of his eyes or the shape of his mouth that unearthed rotten, sharp teeth.

“Princess,” He said, extending a pale hand in her direction. Was she the princess? It would explain the stupid dress and the tiara tangled in her curls, but it made no sense. She had just popped here ten minutes ago, how could she already have a role in all of this?

She took his hand because what choice did she have, and it was cold to the touch, almost icy. This man wasn’t human, she was now sure of it.

“Your father is extremely worried, your Highness, you took off before he could even announce your suitors.” The man smiled and Kady felt a cold shiver run down her spine.

“My suitors?”

His eyes were shining with a disturbing delight, Kady didn’t like this guy, “Your wedding is afoot, your Highness, the suitors have come from all across the kingdom to win your hand. Your father has opened the tournament to every king or lord of this land and beyond.” He grasped Kady’s hand tighter and pressed his frigid lips on her skin. ”Myself included.”

_ Oh hell no. _

Kady yanked her hand away, unbalancing the man in the process. She stood up as he fell and wrenched off her heels in rage. “I’m not a price to be won, you asshole.” She fought the desire to kick him in the balls, but she decided against it. Two other knights tried to grab her but she dodged them both, booting the tallest one in the leg as she bolted towards the forest.

She had no idea what the hell was going on, she didn’t know where she was, why she was here and if Alice was okay, but she knew that this man with the snake eyes and putrid mouth didn’t have her best interest at heart and that she needed to run as far as possible. But the moment she tried to enter the forest and vanish behind the trees, her legs gave out abruptly under her, making her crash hard on the coarse ground.

She didn’t know why she couldn’t move, why her body refused to work with her, but her legs couldn’t run and her arms couldn’t lift her. She was at the mercy of the knights who dragged her from the clearing and onto a horse, attaching her hands to the reigns so she could not flee again. She yelled insults and headbutted one of the knights in the nose, breaking it on the impact, but they didn’t bulge.

It took them two horses to arrive at the castle that, she imagined, belonged to her fictional father. It didn’t look like any castle she had ever seen, but once again maybe her knowledge on Middle Ages architecture wasn’t that evolved, she only knew Whitespire and Blackspire, which weren’t the best example. Either way, it was beautiful in a cold and unobtainable way, with its high glistening towers and gold doors.

She hated it instantly.

The king welcomed them inside nervously, he was a short man with blond hair and green eyes, which made absolutely no logical sense if they were supposed to be related but he did call her daughter and commented on the state of her dress and hair.

“What will your suitors think, Katherine!”

She didn’t comment that her name had never been Katherine, she knew a lost battle when she saw one.

Once they made her change her dress and pull her hair up, they walked her to the back of the castle. She expected a garden of roses or something as stupid, but she found an arena overhanging the sea instead.

The sea made no sense, the arena made no sense, her head was spinning and she felt her energy drain out of her when she heard someone blow a horn on her left. These people were testing her limits on every level.

“The suitors of princess Katherine!” 

Kady groaned as the king, her  _ dad _ , lugged her over to two thrones on a stage that overlooked the entire arena. Men paraded in front of her, bland and boring, spinning their swords in the air like metaphorical dicks. She wondered if someone would catch her before she jumped off the cliff, it seemed like an appropriate response to so many arrogant pricks.

But when she thought all was lost, the clamour caught her attention. “From the kingdom of the thirty seas, the Pirate King and his crew.”

The Pirate King was not, in fact, a  _ he _ . 

Kady could have recognised that hair everywhere, even divided in dirty braids, attached to feathers and jewels. She also knew those eyes too well, that blue shade that drowned her every time she looked too close was unmistakable.

She jumped in the air, an undefinable joy overtaking her, “Alice!” She exclaimed, running off the stage and catching her friend in a tight embrace.

Alice looked tired and filthy, she smelled like sweat and salt, but Kady didn’t care. For a good moment, she truly thought that they had lost each other. Alice returned her hug, her hands found Kady’s lower back and wrapped her even tighter, someone behind them gasped but Kady couldn’t feel in herself to give a fuck.

She pulled back just to watch Alice’s face. She wasn’t wearing her glasses and freckles had blossomed on the bridge of her nose where the sun must have hit her constantly as she sailed, Kady fought the desire to kiss them.

“I thought you were dead,” She said instead, letting herself get stranded in the depth of Alice’s eyes, “I looked for you in the library but I couldn’t find you.”

“The books swallowed me,” Alice explained and Kady felt her fingers trace something on the skin her dress was exposing. “I think one of Everett’s followers must have cursed it and now we’re stuck in a fairytale.”

“This is supposed to be a fairytale? Because believe me, this doesn’t feel very child-friendly.”

Alice smiled slightly and it highlighted how tan she was, which, once again, made no sense since she’d been gone no longer than an hour but Kady didn’t feel like asking how any of this could be possible right now. “Fairytales used to be very gruesome before we made children movies out of them.”

“So we’re stuck in a world where I’m getting sold over to virgins for a few crops?” She sighed, “We don’t even have any magic to fight this.”

“To be honest, I imagined that our roles would be reversed,” Alice said, pointing at Kady’s dress and to her own raggedy clothes. “I think you’re much more of a pirate king.”

“That’s typecasting.”

Alice rolled her eyes, but Kady could see the amusement on her face. “I just think you’re more of a badass, that’s all.”

That was one of the best compliments Kady had ever received in her life, but it wasn’t entirely true. “Don’t underestimate yourself, you’re a legit bad bitch, Quinn.”

Someone cleared their throat behind them and Kady was brought back to the fact that they weren’t alone in this arena. Her fictional dad was watching them, fury blazing in his eyes and the creepy snake man was huffing next to him, clearly jealous that Alice had still a hand on Kady’s naked back.

“King of the thirty seas,” The man started, his voice low and dripping with pleasantries, “Forgive the princess’ demonstration and please, don’t take it as a declaration. She does not have a say in the choice of her suitor.”

“Like hell, I don’t.”

Alice squinted, her gaze boring into the man with barely concealed hatred. “If the princess wishes to choose me as her husband, I don’t see why I should ignore her wishes.”

This shouldn’t have been hot, Kady thought as she watched Alice defy the men around them and call herself her husband, not when they were just friends who did  _ not  _ talk about what was going on between them. But it was incredibly hot.

The man continued, a little crisped, “The suitor is not chosen by the princess’ goodwill but by a battle to the death, your Highness.”

Alice took a step forward, her left hand clutching Kady’s as she walked while the other grabbed something hanging from her hips, a sword. “Then let’s fight,  _ sir _ .”

More dramatic gasps erupted around them and Kady felt the back of her neck heat up with arousal. So women sword fighting for her hand and honour was a kink of hers, good to know.

The man's smile grew even wider, revealing more teeth and more rot and just yikes, Kady was tired of him. If she could stab him herself, she would. "Then, let's start." He took off his cape, throwing it to the ground and pulled his sword, pointing it at Alice's heart.   
  
Kady didn't like this, she didn't trust this world to not completely fuck her over. She didn't let go of Alice's hand when she made a move towards the man, she didn't want to lose her, not when she didn't know if dying here was permanent.

"Are you sure about this?"

Alice turned towards her and took her chin between two fingers. It was intimate, a little too much for two friends, but Kady didn't complain, she didn't think she could. "Do you trust me?"

Kady let out a sharp breath, surprised by her own automatic answer. "Always."

The look of pure elation on Alice's face could have brought down nations, Kady was sure of it. Alice's fingers moved from her chin to her cheek, caressing the side of Kady's face, "I have to ask this, it's very important because I think we can only get out of this book if we play into this narrative. I think this spell can be broken if we give it the ending it deserves, so I have to know." She took a deep breath, her nails leaving a red mark on Kady's temple.

"If we were in the real world, would you want this?" Alice asked, her mouth so close to Kady's that she could feel her breath on her bottom lip.

She didn't have to think about that answer either, but giving it would mean divulging a big part of her, a part she couldn't take back if something went wrong. She knew how things worked for her when feelings were involved, she couldn't stop the pain she felt every time she saw Penny Twenty-Three's familiar and yet untouchable face, she couldn't stop the regrets pouring out of her every time she heard Julia laugh. Love had never been kind to Kady Orloff-Diaz, why would this time be different?

Maybe, a voice inside of her said, maybe love isn't different, but Alice _is_.

Kady had never met someone like Alice, she couldn't remember seeing this particular brand of righteous and angry that was so appealing. She'd never met someone who could annoy her as much as turning her own. Kady had loved before and her love had been bright and bruising, but she didn't remember ever loving someone like Alice Quinn.

"Yes," She said against Alice's soft lips, letting the taste of her mouth overtake her, "Yes, I'd want this."

Her memory became blurry after the kiss, she could only remember pieces of the fight, but details were lost on her. She thought she remembered swords clashing, someone screaming in pain, but before she could find out who had won her hand, there was a flash of light and she was back in the library. Her dress had been replaced by her usual jeans and leather jacket, magic had reappeared, she could smell it in the air like the scent of dirt after a storm, and her fingers were interlaced with Alice's.

"So that was," She started, blinking with confusion. She felt like all of her body had been chopped into small parts and dropped in a blender. Nothing felt real except for the weight of Alice's hand in her own.

Alice turned towards her, she'd lost all her freckles and regained her glasses. Her hair was clean and she no longer smelled like the sea, maybe it should have disappointed Kady to lose a sexy Pirate King, but she couldn't feel anything else than happiness while she watched Alice wiggle her nose in joy.

Alice took her hand and placed it on her back, on the same spot she had held Kady in the book and pressed herself close, her lips grazing the skin of Kady's ear. "It was a fairytale." She said and Kady believed her.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on [tumblr](https://starryspice.tumblr.com/)


End file.
